The Year of the Horse
Seeing as this is the year of the horse, I'm determine to make this my year. I've taken 3 lessons a week with Sally in an attempt to transfer some of her learnings of Leo into my mind. Hopefully I have been successful.
Building our confidence
Leading up to Full Gallop, our one horse trial, we schooled cross country twice. Sally kept it pretty low-key to build Leo's confidence. We weren't schooling prelim fences as my ego hoped and really only jumped a handful of training fences. Our first xc was at Jumping Branch Farm. Leo was a maniac and he actually refused a novice fence. hah! So naughty. At the water, Leo jumped right in over the log into the water and we let him stop with that. We didn't bother to add the fence prior to the jump into the water. Again, Sally's objective leading to a competition is purely confidence. Our second xc school was at Sandy Hills. Leo was great and bravely jumped off the banks into the water. No problem at all.
During our jump lessons, the fences were bigger. The striding simulated 12 ft competition striding. I had a couple of lessons were I came out and hit every distance and nailed every fence. And I had a couple of lessons where my timing, Leo's canter, our rhythm took 5-6 fences to develop.
During one flat lesson, Sally really put her foot up my ass. She said I had ask for more and expect more. Leo was a better horse and capable of more, than I gave him credit for on the flat. She said I ride to avoid the fight and because of this, Leo has total control and trains me, versus the other way around. I need to be persistent - not aggressive or abusive - and demand more of his flatwork. During one lesson, we canter for nearly 15 minutes straight on 10-meter circles (ok, more like 12 meter circles). Leo was pissed and frustrated. Rather than carry his weight properly or bend as needed, he would drop his shoulders left, then throw his haunches right, then swap leads and throw his head and refuse to move off my leg. Eventually, we developed a really quality canter and bend and Leo went to work allow his body to supple. It wasn't easy and it was easy to get frustrated, but Sally was persistent that I raise my expectations and the quality of my riding to achieve more in my flatwork.
Full Gallop Horse Trials
All this led up to the first competition of the season at Full Gallop. The questions on course were significantly harder than the Sporting Days Horse Trial the weekend before, which I didn't do. Sporting Days combinations with skinnies were straight forward; Full Gallop's combinations all involved short striding and bending lines AND skinnies. I walked the course yesterday and was intimidated so I mentally ran through the questions Leo and I have come across to-date in our competitions (and which we successfully negotiated). Sally always tells me at competitions you have to have faith in your training and let it take over. You can't school everything, nor should you try.
Dressage was crap. Again. We scored a 48.1. One of the problems was that you warmed up in one area to start, then moved to another area to finish your warm-up - about 5 minutes out from your ride time. I can't move Leo to different locations without blowing his mind. I had to start our warm-up all over again, but didn't have enough time to settle him down. We blew our walk work, trot to right lead canter depart and just got really low marks due to his level of tension and anxiety. (I take it with a grain of salt now, especially after having listen to Ashley and Becca goad me all week about how Leo acts and jumps like an advanced level event horse).
The stadium course was big and I was nervous! I'm pretty sure my legs were shaking - which may just have been low blood sugar, I'm not sure. I was fine once I got into the ring. Whew. Leo and I threw down a great round and just had the last fence down. Sally said I was a hair too quick in my tempo so Leo was just slightly past each distance. But he jumps the hell out of his fences and he is much more rideable now so I can rate him better between jumps.
Cross country was fantastic. The highlights:
Building our confidence
Leading up to Full Gallop, our one horse trial, we schooled cross country twice. Sally kept it pretty low-key to build Leo's confidence. We weren't schooling prelim fences as my ego hoped and really only jumped a handful of training fences. Our first xc was at Jumping Branch Farm. Leo was a maniac and he actually refused a novice fence. hah! So naughty. At the water, Leo jumped right in over the log into the water and we let him stop with that. We didn't bother to add the fence prior to the jump into the water. Again, Sally's objective leading to a competition is purely confidence. Our second xc school was at Sandy Hills. Leo was great and bravely jumped off the banks into the water. No problem at all.
During our jump lessons, the fences were bigger. The striding simulated 12 ft competition striding. I had a couple of lessons were I came out and hit every distance and nailed every fence. And I had a couple of lessons where my timing, Leo's canter, our rhythm took 5-6 fences to develop.
During one flat lesson, Sally really put her foot up my ass. She said I had ask for more and expect more. Leo was a better horse and capable of more, than I gave him credit for on the flat. She said I ride to avoid the fight and because of this, Leo has total control and trains me, versus the other way around. I need to be persistent - not aggressive or abusive - and demand more of his flatwork. During one lesson, we canter for nearly 15 minutes straight on 10-meter circles (ok, more like 12 meter circles). Leo was pissed and frustrated. Rather than carry his weight properly or bend as needed, he would drop his shoulders left, then throw his haunches right, then swap leads and throw his head and refuse to move off my leg. Eventually, we developed a really quality canter and bend and Leo went to work allow his body to supple. It wasn't easy and it was easy to get frustrated, but Sally was persistent that I raise my expectations and the quality of my riding to achieve more in my flatwork.
Full Gallop Horse Trials
All this led up to the first competition of the season at Full Gallop. The questions on course were significantly harder than the Sporting Days Horse Trial the weekend before, which I didn't do. Sporting Days combinations with skinnies were straight forward; Full Gallop's combinations all involved short striding and bending lines AND skinnies. I walked the course yesterday and was intimidated so I mentally ran through the questions Leo and I have come across to-date in our competitions (and which we successfully negotiated). Sally always tells me at competitions you have to have faith in your training and let it take over. You can't school everything, nor should you try.
Dressage was crap. Again. We scored a 48.1. One of the problems was that you warmed up in one area to start, then moved to another area to finish your warm-up - about 5 minutes out from your ride time. I can't move Leo to different locations without blowing his mind. I had to start our warm-up all over again, but didn't have enough time to settle him down. We blew our walk work, trot to right lead canter depart and just got really low marks due to his level of tension and anxiety. (I take it with a grain of salt now, especially after having listen to Ashley and Becca goad me all week about how Leo acts and jumps like an advanced level event horse).
The stadium course was big and I was nervous! I'm pretty sure my legs were shaking - which may just have been low blood sugar, I'm not sure. I was fine once I got into the ring. Whew. Leo and I threw down a great round and just had the last fence down. Sally said I was a hair too quick in my tempo so Leo was just slightly past each distance. But he jumps the hell out of his fences and he is much more rideable now so I can rate him better between jumps.
Cross country was fantastic. The highlights:
- Fence 4 was a solid trakehner. The rider before me fell there and was standing there with her horse being tended to when I came through. Leo took a good hard look but went. I remembered that Ashley said Trakehners were galloping fences and really, Leo had too much momentum to stop :)
- Fence 6ABC was the coffin. This fence was intimidating because it was the first combination. It was a roll top to a ditch so large I couldn't step across it, then 3 bending strides to a skinny out. Some accomplished rider came over to talk to Sally and told her he was intimidated by the ditch - which was big and filled with water. I was like: great, if this rider is intimidated, I should definitely be intimidated. Sally said not to override the ditch and miss the out at C. Leo was foot perfect here.
- Fence 7 was the first water. It was a short right hand turn, a raised log into the water and a skinny log on the way out. In the approach, Leo had to gallop by a pile of buckets and random fencing equipment. I knew he was going to spook and he did. He jumped right and we were off our line. It was an ugly jump into the water but I was determined to not have a stop.
- Fence 13AB was the second water. This water was intimidating. A roll top sat at the top of a drop into the water, followed by a roll top out of the water. It was the drop in that required the bravery. Leo was brilliant. There wasn't even a touch of hesitation.
- Fence 15AB was a large bank drop 3/4 bending strides to a chevron skinny. I got Leo back and he was so good here. We got to the skinny at an angle but it was no issue.
Sally said we are totally solid and showing all the signs that a move-up is the right move. The XC fences aren't backing Leo off any more. Our xc ride is smooth and controlled and our stadium is becoming consistent. The plan is to move up to Prelim in June at Plantation.
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| trakehner |
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| Coffin |
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| Ditch close-up |
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| Drop into water |
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